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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. How does Dillard believe the seeking of God takes place?
(a) the seeking of God is a continuous loop, which never ends
(b) Singing in the shower
(c) God is everywhere but the best place to seek is in church
(d) God is in nature

2. How does Dillard see time?
(a) as a maze of days
(b) as an arrow through space
(c) as a continuous loop or an ascending spiral
(d) as being too long when waiting

3. What is the analogy she draws between the snake skin and the seasons?
(a) seasons are a continuous loop, just as she thought the snakeskin was
(b) snakes shed skins in accordance with the seasons
(c) there is no analogy between snakes and seasons
(d) snakes move depending on the season

4. Dillard opens this first chapter remembering this animal.
(a) an alligator she saw in the zoo
(b) a poodle that lived down the street from her
(c) an old tomcat that she used to have
(d) a robin whose nest fell from the tree

5. How are Eskimos able to survive in such a harsh environment as theirs?
(a) they had to possess an intimate understanding of their natural world
(b) they wear seal fur
(c) they eat a lot of whale
(d) their igloos are kept very warm

Short Answer Questions

1. Why do the male praying mantis come near the female?

2. Why did early Eskimos love winter?

3. What does the author say the future is?

4. How does Dillard think of Tinker Creek in the first chapter?

5. How much of life which has ever been created, is living at the present time?

Short Essay Questions

1. What physics concept does Dillard use to write about observing muskrats? How does she use it?

2. What story does Dillard tell about a Native American woman and winter?

3. Dillard believes that the death of the self is painless. What might she mean by this?

4. What might Dillard's fascination and stories about the praying mantis demonstrate?

5. How does Dillard tie in Moses with her observations at Tinker Creek?

6. What is the correlation Dillard sees between time and the search for God?

7. What is her purpose in the mimicking?

8. Describe Dillard's visit to a horse ranch and what happened.

9. How is the story about the caddisfly applicable to Dillard's obsession with the present?

10. How does Dillard relate the plankton to the Eskimo learning about Christianity and to herself?

(see the answer keys)

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